Superduper rescues the world's rarest discolite!

Reli

Member (SA)
Dec 24, 2010
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I saw this a few months ago, and had to have it. It's a Berecha DL-26, and I own the only one that appears in a Google search! Now, I do remember seeing one or two boxes with this same shape and style before, so maybe there's an AKA....but it's probably rare too. Anyway, it's a 3-piece box with a rotating disco ball, left and right projector lamps, power output meters on each detachable speaker, and power INPUT meters under the disco ball. Check it out!

Berecha DL-26 boombox.jpg



When it arrived, its cheap build quality became obvious. It's a black box, after all. The chips are all Chinese, the tuner has very weak reception, and the tape decks are extremely low-quality and make scraping noises. It needed new bulbs, really hard to find ones (7.2 and 14.4 volt :huh: ). And, it doesn't even have Line In! :thumbsdown: So, some upgrades were in order. :rock: What you see below is a bundle of parts Superduper rigged together in a way only he knows how! An RCA input board, a Bluetooth receiver powered by a DC:DC isolator module to suppress noise on BT when no music is playing, and a selector knob with lights for each function.

Now of course, all of these parts came from China, so they weren't necessarily optimized for the job. The boards didn't even have any mounting holes! :thumbsdown: Superduper had to create a new board and attach it like a sandwich. I'm sure he'll be along soon to explain it better.... But, the ingenuity and patience he displayed during this process was nothing short of amazing. This box rocks now! So much more versatile.


Berecha7.JPG

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Berecha knob.JPG

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T-STER

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Jul 14, 2014
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Wow that's is very cool! I saw the thread on SuperDupers work and wondered what box it was for. That's ingenious and makes the box so much more usable. Good work Norm and congrats Reli
 

Transistorized

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Jun 19, 2012
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Very cool Reli. I can honestly say that I have never seen anything like that before. It must be even more cool to know that you own the only one..or at least the only one with aux inputs :-)
 

blu_fuz

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Jun 3, 2009
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Sometimes, no matter what box it is, superduper mods are totally worth it!
 

MyOhMy

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Jul 26, 2015
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Whether it be strange, ugly, weird, just plain unusual or a rare gem I know not - but I had to laugh when I saw it. :yes: One thing is for sure, this box has so many novelty elements I'd love to have one. I think it's great - in it's own way, of course. I enjoyed reading the write up regarding the build quality and how this can be improved.

If ever there was another version of this box I'd tend to think the speakers and the abundance of lights would all be detachable to enable the ultimate in portable bedroom disco audio. :-D
 

Reli

Member (SA)
Dec 24, 2010
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Pretty sure it's late 80's. There's a few others with disco balls, but they're square 1-piece boxes like this one. I haven't seen another 3-piece shaped like mine.

HBSS discolite.jpg
 

Superduper

Member (SA)
That boombox is larger than it looks in the photos. And it grows on you. The deck however is a stupid design, I discovered that the 3D80 has a similar design and also has some similar trouble with the deck. The capstan flywheel is wafer thin with little to no mass, and thus unable to dampen any wow-flutter in the rotating assembly, therefore their solution was to install a spring charged nylon block that rubs against the rotating flywheel face. Unfortunately, friction is not a good substitution for mass to dampen motor speed pulse variances. Plus the rubbing block also makes..... yep you guessed it, it makes a rubbing sound which now due to degradation of flywheel surfaces and perhaps the nylon block itself, has become a scraping sound. So on all decks of this design, you can expect undesirable built in noise by design, poor wow & flutter, and speed issues. In any event, not a serious deck design in my opinion. After all, even cheap entry level mono boxes on virtually all name brand boomboxes have normal weighted flywheels. How much money did they save by going this design?

Anyhow, back to the Berecha:
But hey, Disco Ball, Saturday night fever style... what's not to like?
And while the box design is not high quality construction by any means, even the speakers is fully open serving no more purpose than an open back cardboard box, yet is sounds surprisingly good. Single driver but decent bass, excellent highs and the amplifier is noise-free. Oh and did I mention... it does grow on you.
 

Styleking

Member (SA)
Mar 16, 2011
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Great Box! :bow: I have 2 questions though: Do the lights above the speakers pivot? In other incarnations those lights shine on the disco ball. Secondly, how does the handle work? It looks as if it would strike the disco ball in the upright position? :hmmm: